


penumbral games

by spookykingdomstarlight



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Complicated Relationships, Established Relationship, Flirting, Intimacy, Kissing, Light Angst, M/M, Necking In Abandoned Hallways, Pre-Epilogue, Responsibility, Sneaking Around, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-07
Updated: 2019-04-07
Packaged: 2020-01-05 23:30:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,683
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18376301
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spookykingdomstarlight/pseuds/spookykingdomstarlight
Summary: “What I deserve is debatable, but what I want is you,” Curtis said, not blunt, but still brooking no argument. His thumb and forefinger took Shiro’s chin between them and squeezed. “Maybe a bit of dinner, too, would be nice, but I’m not sacrificing myself by being here. I want us. Whatever that means until this war is through. Do you understand?”





	penumbral games

“We shouldn’t be doing this right now,” Shiro said. His voice, barely a whisper, roughened with the need and want that he never, ever admitted to, not even when they had a few moments to themselves, not even when privacy was ensured by shadows, Curtis dragging him to the most out of the way corner of the _Atlas_ that he could find them that didn’t actually involve kidnapping Shiro and leaving the damned ship entirely. It was only partly false pretenses that brought them to this point—Curtis may have intimated there was something cool and useful out this way—but since Shiro and he were off-duty and painfully reachable in case of an emergency, Curtis couldn’t bring himself to feel as bad about it as Shiro always did.

Besides, it was kind of cool out this way. The ambient temperature was approximately 0.3 degrees less than the temperature on _Atlas’s_ bridge. So it wasn’t a lie technically.

It was okay though. Curtis wasn’t stupid. He knew how far he could push Shiro before Shiro snapped back and let his responsibilities weigh him down again; he hadn’t reached that point yet. It was a delicate balance and Curtis has learned how to read Shiro better even than the instruments he worked every day. He’d get maybe ten more minutes out of Shiro before he snaked out from beneath Curtis’s touch and insisted they go back. It was a toss-up from there whether he’d further insist they show their faces in the commons— _it boosts morale, Curtis, as long as I don’t overdo it, nobody likes their CO hanging around too long_ —or if he’d at least let himself pursue the semi-privacy of dinner in the mess while everyone else was too busy shoveling food in their mouths to pay attention to what Curtis was doing to Shiro’s ankle with the toe of his boot.

That might’ve been nice.

In any case, Curtis had a lot of ideas about what they could be doing in their off-hours, but they’d make Shiro blush, so Curtis settled for running his fingers down the smooth line of Shiro’s jaw, fanning his thumb across Shiro’s lower lip. That made Shiro blush, too, but it didn’t make him skittish or get that guilt-ridden look in his eyes that he got sometimes when Curtis tried to make him feel good, so Curtis took the win.

Curtis took it as a compliment, too, though if they lingered too long, he could see it going another way entirely, but Curtis was an optimist. This war would be over someday, maybe someday soon even now that Honerva was gone and all that was left was cleanup, really, and he’d have all the time in the world to set Shiro right then.

That guilt wouldn’t linger. Curtis was sure of it. Shiro wasn’t the type to let guilt keep him down for long. He was too resilient for that.

The fact that Shiro let himself have this at all was a good indicator that what Curtis felt for him was fully reciprocated, even if Shiro hesitated with him more often than not. It wasn’t a reflection on Curtis, and the exasperation he felt was fond as a result. And the same could be said for Shiro if the huff of overly dramatic despair he offered now was any indication.

“You’re incorrigible,” Shiro muttered, but his teeth raked lightly over the pad of Curtis’s thumb and the flash of a smile was visible behind it, even better than the touch of Shiro’s mouth against his skin. Comparatively, a kiss was easy. Smiles, on the contrary, were very, very hardtop get out of him.

Curtis upgraded his estimate to fifteen minutes and promised without words that he’d be extra nice to Shiro at dinner, wouldn’t try to make him choke on his food or anything as he said or did something mildly suggestive. It wasn’t something he did when others were around anyway, of course, but if they were left alone? He’d go easy on Shiro.

Just this once.

“I really am. I don’t think you hate it though,” Curtis agreed, forcing his voice into a lower pitch with the hope that Shiro would laugh. What could he say? He got greedy on occasion. And giving Shiro a moment of happiness was one of the things he got greedy about, since it happened so rarely. He slipped his thumb between Shiro’s lips for a brief moment, pulling at the corner, unable to help himself, and leaned in close, replacing it with his mouth when he got tired of not kissing him.

Shiro groaned in agreement and lifted his hands to cup Curtis’s face. He liked the rough, scarred heat of Shiro’s palm contrasted to the cool, smooth, almost humming quality of his prosthetic. His nails raked through Curtis’s hairline and send shivers radiating down his spine. They both felt so different, but they were both Shiro to the core.

It made him want things he wasn’t likely to get.

For example, he would really have liked to further press Shiro into the wall and maybe…

But no, no. It was nice enough to kiss him, to be with him as they were, as Shiro and Curtis, their roles be damned just the teensiest, tiniest bit. The rest could be saved for the genuine privacy of Shiro’s quarters.

“One of these days we’re gonna get caught like this,” Shiro said, pulling away, heavy with restraint. His mouth twisted in regret and his gaze went distant. “We should probably head back.”

Six minutes. Six minutes since Curtis backed Shiro into this wall and hoped he’d get ten minutes before Shiro thought better of the whole thing. Not quite a record, but close.

Sighing, he rested his head against Shiro’s shoulder and almost laughed. Oh, Shiro. He’d always be the most principled of them all. Damn him. “Yeah,” Curtis said, quiet, trying to keep the disappointment from his voice because he knew a losing fight when he saw one, “we can do that.”

But before he could fully disentangle himself from Shiro, Shiro wrapped his hand around Curtis’s and squeezed it. And then he brought Curtis’s hand up to his mouth and pressed a kiss to his knuckles. “You’re too good to me,” he said, which wasn’t true at all. He liked, at best, to think he was as good to Shiro as Shiro was to him. Despite all the ways Shiro refused to break regs or do anything Curtis would consider fun, Curtis loved him. And he loved him for the way he was such a stickler for everything. Even if it was inconvenient. Maybe especially when it was inconvenient. Because it just proved how much Shiro cared. He must’ve made a sound of disbelief, though he was still caught up in the feel of Shiro’s mouth against his hand, because Shiro shook his head. “No, really. I mean it. I know I’m not…”

They’d had this conversation before. He could see the beats of it playing out yet again if he didn’t cut them off at the source.

“You’re exactly who I want. Exactly as you are. I’m no saint either, Shiro. You’re just harder on yourself than you are on other people.”

Shiro smiled weakly and ducked his head, endearingly sweet. It made him wonder how long it’d been for him since he’d been with anyone else. He was always so damned _careful_ with Curtis, acted like what they shared would break if he held it too closely. It never stopped him from doing what he had to when they were in the midst of battle, but outside of those circumstances, he seemed to flounder, unsure of himself. It made Curtis want to shake them, whoever they were, for making him this way. Or maybe he just wanted to shake Shiro for hesitating unnecessarily, for taking lessons from that relationship that were unhelpful in this one.

Then again, maybe it was just bad circumstances. Goodness knew Shiro’d had it rough and still wasn’t all that lucky.

Curtis hooked his arm around Shiro’s neck and pulled him in, forehead to forehead. “Let’s head back. Thanks for indulging me as much as you have.”

“You deserve—”

“What I deserve is debatable, but what I want is you,” Curtis said, not blunt, but still brooking no argument. His thumb and forefinger took Shiro’s chin between them and squeezed. “Maybe a bit of dinner, too, would be nice, but I’m not sacrificing myself by being here. I want us. Whatever that means until this war is through. Do you understand?”

If Shiro didn’t nod himself, Curtis might have tipped his head up and down just to get the point across, but he did and he laughed slightly, eyes crinkling at the corner. “Yeah, I get it.”

“Okay.” And that was enough for now, truly. Something Curtis hadn’t even realized was there unclenched inside of him and let him relax. Shiro was looking at him with steady, happy eyes, and Curtis believed that everything would be okay. For real and not just because he had to hope it would be so. He darted in for one last kiss, sure they wouldn’t be caught even if Shiro worried they would, but before he could pull away again, Shiro bit at his lip, clamped his hand around the back of Curtis’s head.

“I guess maybe we can stay a few more minutes,” Shiro admitted in a near whisper. His voice went rough now with amusement. “You did find a pretty out of the way spot.”

And Curtis still wasn’t dumb. He knew an opening when he saw one and knew how to take it without further question.

They might have managed a record seventeen minutes before Shiro finally insisted, for real this time, that they go back and Curtis couldn’t have been more pleased with that fact if he wanted to be.

Things really were going to be just fine. He was sure of it. And he thought maybe Shiro was beginning to see things that way, too, which was even better.

**Author's Note:**

> This is a fill for the 76 Kiss Meme that's been floating around on tumblr since forever, I think, but I’ve been taking requests over at [my dreamwidth](https://spookykingdomstarlight.dreamwidth.org/12654.html). For this particular fill, I decided to write “Hiding/hoping not to be caught kiss.”


End file.
